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shadowkat1. FB, Instagram, and Youtube want me to buy a Mellow Cloud Pillow for some absurd reason. I've been pummeled with ads on it on all three. The evil marketing people have figured out how to manipulate us into buying things via social media platforms. Must resist. Otherwise they win. I do not need a Mellow ergonomic pillow - also been there done that, and they never work for me.
2. After re-watching all of Buffy and up to Angel S5 Episode 17, I've picked up on a few things that I feel compelled to share...
* For a low-budget television series done in the 1990s-early 00s, and at a fast pace, with 22 episodes per season, not to mention being on the brink of cancellation? These series are brilliant in many ways - almost flawless in acting, stunts, special effects, and dialogue. Why? The show-runner was a perfectionist madman and bullied his cast and crew into providing him with what he wanted. I didn't know that when I previously watched. Now that I do - it explains a lot. Emma Caulfeild explains how she was basically tortured into giving that amazing performance in The Body. Whedon made her do the monologue and scene until it was perfect, which meant twenty-thirty takes. All she remembers from it - is how hungry she was and she had to go to the bathroom, and so did everyone else, and they desperately wanted to finish the scene and break - and they had a penalty because it had gone past lunch. It's a brilliant scene - but damn.
* The best character arcs are - Spike on Buffy and Wes on Angel. And they both have one thing in common - outside of the fact that they are both in the Buffyverse - Whedon had no idea what he was going to do with either character, how they fit into the story, or plot. Interestingly enough? Whedon did carefully plot out all the others - specifically Cordelia and Willow, and was proud of it. But, ironically, Cordelia and Willow have the worst character arcs - neither quite works, both are clumsy, and both rely way too much on possession by an outside source and comic book gimmickry. (ie. Whedon spent too much time obsessing over Dark Phoenix for his own good.)
Honestly, the problem with S6 is that the Willow arc doesn't work. It should. And it would work with a bit of tweaking. But Whedon didn't really know how to do it - just that he wanted to turn Willow dark because Vamp Willow was so much fun. Cordelia - same problem - it doesn't work - it should, and would with a bit of tweaking, but the writer did all the wrong things. Neither actress enjoyed the arc, and both struggled to portray it.
I'm not saying it couldn't have worked - or the idea wasn't kind of interesting - just that the execution is poorly done. Willow's should have been more about power, and less about addiction. The addiction metaphors in Smashed through Entropy are tired.
Fred to Illyria works better than Cordelia's descent into evil. Both are about possession or something taking them over. Cordelia's though was kind of consensual? While Fred's was more accidental. The difficulty with Cordelia's is - the writers weren't on the same page, and Whedon took what Greenwalt did and tried to twist it around, and it doesn't work? If anything, it's kind of offensive? While Fred-Illyria is much better done. Mainly because the writers were on the same page.
* Angel can't be redeemed because he's too busy fighting with himself to get anywhere. (Makes him the perfect noir anti-hero, but also kind of stale by the end of the fifth season. I can see why the actor wasn't that interested in revisiting the role - unless he could banter with Spike. The character can't evolve - he just goes around in a circle because of the curse. That was the same problem with Buffy/Angel - they couldn't go anywhere except in a circle. That's the main difference between Spike and Angel (there are many differences but that's the main one) - Spike is integrated, he's at peace with who he is, and both sides of himself. Angel is at war with himself, there's a part of Angel who fully embraced the demon and loved doing evil - couldn't look away from it. His issue is with Daddy's approval, not with love. He doesn't care about being loved. He cares about legacy, purpose, destiny and approval. Spike on the other hand cares mainly about love - he's a fool for love, or love's bitch. He lives in the world not above it, doesn't want to destroy it, enjoys things in it, and main issue was whether he was loved. He's not necessarily looking for a destiny or redemption, he's looking for a way to love and be loved in return. He cares about the world, the people in it, and his friends, and Buffy. He doesn't really have anything to prove, nor does he require approval.
3. My soap opera is aggravating me, which is par for the course with soap operas, they tend to be that way by nature? I watch them because I get invested in various characters.
The Pitt, on the other hand, is excellent and my favorite television show at the moment. It's very comforting. Also it looks exactly like the ER's that I've been inside of in NYC. Certainly looks a lot like the one in NYU Langone. It's about problem solving in crisis mode. And shows a lot of kindness. Very nice antidote to my rising misanthropy - caused by a combination of factors, public transportation, crazy org, national news (the small scraps I get), and the soap opera. Also social media platforms (not this one - Dreamwidth is kind of an oasis in a sea of negativity and ads.).
4. A co-worker (Moscow Co-worker) sent the following article link to myself, Breaking Bad, and various other co-workers for our reading pleasure.
"For you reading pleasure (long article that spooked some people yesterday):"2028 Global Intelligence Crisis
To which Breaking Bad replied: "Way too long and technical for me."
Sigh. It is. It's also about how AI is taking away our jobs and evil tech revolution is taking away jobs ....reminds me of the industrial revolution.
No wonder it scared folks.
Actually, if you've studied history (specifically between 1870s-1980s) and have a mind for pattern recognition, you may realize how incredibly similar the two trajectories are. I'm not sure if that's comforting or not? Does kind of promote a feeling of general misanthropy and malaise. But hey, at least we know if things get worse than the height of the industrial revolution (that was the atomic bomb and WWI and II), we're all dead.
And on that happy note - I'm off to bed, hopefully to sleep and not dream overly much.
2. After re-watching all of Buffy and up to Angel S5 Episode 17, I've picked up on a few things that I feel compelled to share...
* For a low-budget television series done in the 1990s-early 00s, and at a fast pace, with 22 episodes per season, not to mention being on the brink of cancellation? These series are brilliant in many ways - almost flawless in acting, stunts, special effects, and dialogue. Why? The show-runner was a perfectionist madman and bullied his cast and crew into providing him with what he wanted. I didn't know that when I previously watched. Now that I do - it explains a lot. Emma Caulfeild explains how she was basically tortured into giving that amazing performance in The Body. Whedon made her do the monologue and scene until it was perfect, which meant twenty-thirty takes. All she remembers from it - is how hungry she was and she had to go to the bathroom, and so did everyone else, and they desperately wanted to finish the scene and break - and they had a penalty because it had gone past lunch. It's a brilliant scene - but damn.
* The best character arcs are - Spike on Buffy and Wes on Angel. And they both have one thing in common - outside of the fact that they are both in the Buffyverse - Whedon had no idea what he was going to do with either character, how they fit into the story, or plot. Interestingly enough? Whedon did carefully plot out all the others - specifically Cordelia and Willow, and was proud of it. But, ironically, Cordelia and Willow have the worst character arcs - neither quite works, both are clumsy, and both rely way too much on possession by an outside source and comic book gimmickry. (ie. Whedon spent too much time obsessing over Dark Phoenix for his own good.)
Honestly, the problem with S6 is that the Willow arc doesn't work. It should. And it would work with a bit of tweaking. But Whedon didn't really know how to do it - just that he wanted to turn Willow dark because Vamp Willow was so much fun. Cordelia - same problem - it doesn't work - it should, and would with a bit of tweaking, but the writer did all the wrong things. Neither actress enjoyed the arc, and both struggled to portray it.
I'm not saying it couldn't have worked - or the idea wasn't kind of interesting - just that the execution is poorly done. Willow's should have been more about power, and less about addiction. The addiction metaphors in Smashed through Entropy are tired.
Fred to Illyria works better than Cordelia's descent into evil. Both are about possession or something taking them over. Cordelia's though was kind of consensual? While Fred's was more accidental. The difficulty with Cordelia's is - the writers weren't on the same page, and Whedon took what Greenwalt did and tried to twist it around, and it doesn't work? If anything, it's kind of offensive? While Fred-Illyria is much better done. Mainly because the writers were on the same page.
* Angel can't be redeemed because he's too busy fighting with himself to get anywhere. (Makes him the perfect noir anti-hero, but also kind of stale by the end of the fifth season. I can see why the actor wasn't that interested in revisiting the role - unless he could banter with Spike. The character can't evolve - he just goes around in a circle because of the curse. That was the same problem with Buffy/Angel - they couldn't go anywhere except in a circle. That's the main difference between Spike and Angel (there are many differences but that's the main one) - Spike is integrated, he's at peace with who he is, and both sides of himself. Angel is at war with himself, there's a part of Angel who fully embraced the demon and loved doing evil - couldn't look away from it. His issue is with Daddy's approval, not with love. He doesn't care about being loved. He cares about legacy, purpose, destiny and approval. Spike on the other hand cares mainly about love - he's a fool for love, or love's bitch. He lives in the world not above it, doesn't want to destroy it, enjoys things in it, and main issue was whether he was loved. He's not necessarily looking for a destiny or redemption, he's looking for a way to love and be loved in return. He cares about the world, the people in it, and his friends, and Buffy. He doesn't really have anything to prove, nor does he require approval.
3. My soap opera is aggravating me, which is par for the course with soap operas, they tend to be that way by nature? I watch them because I get invested in various characters.
The Pitt, on the other hand, is excellent and my favorite television show at the moment. It's very comforting. Also it looks exactly like the ER's that I've been inside of in NYC. Certainly looks a lot like the one in NYU Langone. It's about problem solving in crisis mode. And shows a lot of kindness. Very nice antidote to my rising misanthropy - caused by a combination of factors, public transportation, crazy org, national news (the small scraps I get), and the soap opera. Also social media platforms (not this one - Dreamwidth is kind of an oasis in a sea of negativity and ads.).
4. A co-worker (Moscow Co-worker) sent the following article link to myself, Breaking Bad, and various other co-workers for our reading pleasure.
"For you reading pleasure (long article that spooked some people yesterday):"2028 Global Intelligence Crisis
To which Breaking Bad replied: "Way too long and technical for me."
Sigh. It is. It's also about how AI is taking away our jobs and evil tech revolution is taking away jobs ....reminds me of the industrial revolution.
No wonder it scared folks.
Actually, if you've studied history (specifically between 1870s-1980s) and have a mind for pattern recognition, you may realize how incredibly similar the two trajectories are. I'm not sure if that's comforting or not? Does kind of promote a feeling of general misanthropy and malaise. But hey, at least we know if things get worse than the height of the industrial revolution (that was the atomic bomb and WWI and II), we're all dead.
And on that happy note - I'm off to bed, hopefully to sleep and not dream overly much.